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As the driverless car story continues to unfold, there are plenty of Isaac Asimov-level questions set to come up.

Do you remember this little slice of cinematic perfection?:

“Dave Bowman: Open the pod bay doors, HAL.HAL: I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.Dave Bowman: What’s the problem?HAL: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.Dave Bowman: What are you talking about, HAL?HAL: This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it.Dave Bowman: I don’t know what you’re talking about, HAL.HAL: I know that you and Frank were planning to disconnect me, and I’m afraid that’s something I cannot allow to happen.”

(A little help for the kids in attendance, it’s the classic dialogue between a spaceship pilot and his onboard computer-gone-mad HAL 9000 in the classic film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Rent it kids, it’s required viewing.)

“If the cops stop the Google driverless car for a moving violation does the car go all HAL 9000 and refuse to pull over? Who gets the ticket? So many unanswered questions.”

The anonymous poster was actually reacting to this very real news story (well, photo) — that the cops pulled over and stopped Google’s driverless car in D.C.

Well … what the heck happens?

It’s a worthwhile question, if the search giant’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt was right when he predicted in this TechCrunch report that “self-driving cars should become the predominant mode of transportation in our lifetime” — these questions are GOING to come up.

Who gets the ticket?

The human driver? Which one? The human driver in the right-hand side passenger seat?

Or, heaven forbid … the company that manufactured and sold the robot-driven car.